A need exists for light-weight metal products that can be used to reduce weight and improve fuel efficiency in applications such as vehicles in the transportation sector. The use of harder light-weight alloys such as those containing magnesium are of particular interest due to their high strength-to-weight ratio, and ductility that makes their use in structural components desirable. However, problems exist in attempting to form products, particularly hollow products from these harder metal alloys. For example, harder alloys typically require substantially larger forces for extrusion and routinely generate extrusion products with inconsistent and non-uniform microstructures which lead to problems in strength and reliability. Conventional processes for forming such devices can also highly energy consumptive processing or multiple steps to achieve desired features which can adds significant costs. The described invention is a system and process for performing shear extrusion that overcomes these problems and enables the creation of high strength hollow structures from harder metals and metal alloys.
The purpose of the foregoing abstract is to enable the United States Patent and Trademark Office and the public generally, especially scientists, engineers, and practitioners in the art who are not familiar with patent or legal terms or phraseology, to determine quickly from a cursory inspection the nature and essence of the technical disclosure of the application. The abstract is neither intended to define the invention of the application, which is measured by the claims, nor is it intended to be limiting as to the scope of the invention in any way.